Republic of Korea

The land of kimchee, boy/girl bands, and plastic surgery. At least that's what most Japanese people think, and after having visited Seoul, the capital city of South Korea, four times I think korea lives up to that image fairly well.

Kimchee is served with pretty much every meal, and I am pretty confident in saying that the large majority of restaurants will automatically give you kimchee (and free refills).

Boy and girl bands; now I am sure you are scratching your heads and saying to yourself "I thought they disappeared with the end of the 90s?" Well, not in Korea. They are more prevalent than ever, and I am sure there is not a single Korean person (Or possibly Asian living in Asia) that doesn't know who Girl's Generation or Big Bang are.

Now, I am assuming that a number of you reading this aren't familiar so I have prepared selected a couple songs and their accompanying music videos for your viewing pleasure.

Girls' Generation - Mr. Taxi

When searching for this video, I came across a David Letterman clip featuring Girl's Generation singing on the program, so I actually may be incorrect in saying that many of you are unfamiliar with them. It also turns out that the song I have posted "Mr. Taxi" also has a Japanese and English version. 

Now onto a boy band. Big Bang is their name and they are extremely popular in Asia. I bought one of their CD's when I was in Korea last time and I have to say that I quite enjoy listening to them. Does that mean I have been in Asia too long? hahaha. 

Big Bang - Tonight

I have also mentioned plastic surgery at the beginning of my post. It may come as a surprise to most, but South Korea is a very popular destination in Asia to get work done. This article from the New York Times in 2011 suggests that as many as one in every five South Korean women have had some form of plastic surgery. Narcissistic a little? From what some of my Korean friends have told me, looks are extremely important in Korean society in anything from finding a potential partner to being selected or obtaining an interview for job. 

From my personal experience, I noticed that there are certainly no lack of cosmetic surgery clinics in korea and from what I am told the price is fairly reasonable as compared to many other countries. 

Aside from the what I have mentioned above Korea is really a great place to explore. It is certainly more affordable than Japan and there is pretty much something for everyone. 

Here are a few pictures I have taken on my several trips to the country. From traditional temples to the markets that sell anything and everything and on to the ultra chic café's of the Garosugil area there is something for everyone to enjoy. 

                                          

                                           

                           

I had the dessert with the strawberry on top! 

The Big "C" -- China, of Course!

Having only visited China twice, I am far from an expert on anything Chinese. I am sure it would take me hundreds of hours of study and numerous years of living and travelling in China to even break the surface of a country with such a deep history and complex political system.

To some, China it is a place where human rights are violated and freedom of speech is non-existent. To others, it is a bustling economic epicentre where capitalists run the show. One thing I can say with confidence; however, is that China has infiltrated almost every nation, country, or state on this earth, in some way or another. Just take a look at the tag on your clothes, the label on your mobile phone, or the sticker on your child's toys. Chances are that at least one of those things, if not all, will have in some way come from China. 

I have met a few people who refuse to go to China because of what they hear on the news, see on TV. However, I think that it is necessary to visit somewhere and see for yourself before forming and opinion and judging, and I can guarantee you that if you take the time to talk to a Chinese person in China they will have opinions about just about anything and everything. And with all of the technologies today it is quite easy to get around the "Great Firewall" that is so famously blocking large amounts of information found on the internet in most other countries. 

So before judging a book by it's cover, or in this case a country by it's head of state or political affiliations why not jump on a plane, or a boat, or in a car or on the train, and get a first hand look!

My first trip to China was in 2004 during the time I was studying abroad in Japan and I would have to say my first impression wasn't what most people would hope it to be. I was met by a grumpy immigration officer who clearly wasn't in the mood to deal with the hundreds of foreigners lined up in front of him. I made the mistake of not filling out my immigration card properly leading the officer to bark at me in Chinese. I am still not sure what was wrong, as he ended up waiving me through after I stood there for a few minutes with a puzzled look on my face but in the end I was successful in entering the country and making it to my final destination (a youth hostel in central Shanghai where I met one of my dearest Canadian friends). 

My second impression or impressions of China was "There is so much chaos, noise, and pollution...."

Not that I am trying to paint a bad picture of China or that say that I dislike the place, because I really enjoyed visiting China, but I can say that it is like no other place that I have visited. 

Five years later, in 2009 I had the opportunity to visit China for a second time and I would have to say that it has changed dramatically, or at least Shanghai has. Here is a picture from 2004 and a picture from 2009 taken in the same location in Shanghai. 

It's hard to believe that a cityscape can change that much in the spend of five years. I was also amazed by how much the city had been cleaned up and pollution had disappeared. Though, this may have been a result of the wold expo that was taking place at the time of my second visit. I am told by a friend who was living in Shanghai that much of the pollution returned soon after the expo finished and Shanghai disappeared from the international spotlight.

I also had the pleasure of visiting both Hangzhou and Nanjing while in China as well. Hangzhou is famous for it's beauty and West Lake which is located within the city. Though it was still winter and the weather wasn't great, that didn't stop the masses of people taking walks along the lake and hiring a canoe or rowboat to paddle out into the lake.

Nanjing, as most people are aware is most famous for the atrocities that took place during World War II with the "Rape of Nanjing." But because I am not a historian and embarrassingly have to admit that I don't know a whole lot about the incident, I am not going to go into any detail but will instead show a few pictures of what Nanjing looks like today.

The above picture is of the hike up to Dr. Sun Yat-Sen's Mausoleum. Dr. Sun Yat-Sen was a revolutionary who was the founder of what is not the Republic of China, or Taiwan. Though I don't recommend hiking up to the top when it's 30 degrees, like I did, I do highly recommend it for anyone visiting at cooler times.  With some 300 stairs (if my memory is correct) it has quite a view from the top.

This photo above was taken in the southern section of Nanjing near the Confucius temple. It is extremely popular as people can hop on one of the boats and take a cruise down the river. This isn't just any trip, but one filled with neon lights that brighten up the surroundings almost to be point of being a bit tacky!


I am afraid I will need to cut my self off here but note that I will re-visit China in the near future. This is not only because I have left so much out, but also because my next trip to China is already booked and if all goes as planned, I will be on the plane bound for Beijing on May 30th.

Japan

I am fairly certain everyone who knows me, is aware of my slight obsession with travelling. But what seems like an obsession to most, is a passion to me. I just can't seem to sit still for more than a couple months before the itch to travel becomes unbearable. 

In order to share this "obsession" or "passion" or however you would like to classify it, I have decided to write a little bit about each of the countries I have been to in my short twenty eight years on this earth. And what better place to start off with than the country where my passion for travel started. Japan. 

I first travelled to Japan in 2004 to participate in a university study abroad programme. I was elated, not only from being accepted to study abroad, but also about taking my first trip abroad (apart from the U.S.A), though I can't say the same for parents. After some pleading to the ones with the purse and being selected for a scholarship covering the majority of the costs of studying abroad, I packed my bags, boarded the plane and was off to the "Land of the Rising Sun." 

For anyone having lived abroad for more than a couple of months, I am sure you are aware of the flood of emotions that you go through over the course of your stint abroad. Excitement, nervousness, frustration, happiness, loneliness, the list goes on and I am sure that I had experienced them all at that time. But there is no replacement for the sense of fulfillment having made it through that first ten to twelve months. 

My introduction to Japan began in the Kansai region (Osaka, Hyogo, Kyoto etc) and I would have to say that this picture represents Osaka VERY well.

Shin Sekai, Osaka (新世界、大阪）

 

Bright lights, comedians, delicious food and friendly people. These are all characteristics of Osaka and anyone who has spent any time in Osaka will know what I am talking about. Obviously this isn't the "Japan" that most people imagine, but when you spend enough time in Japan this becomes extremely normal. 

Now, I would assume you are scratching your head and wondering "but what about the temples?" Well, being lucky enough to have lived about forty minutes from the ancient capital of Kyoto, I have seen my fair share of temples and enjoy spending the day wandering around the grounds of a temple.  

A couple of my favourites are pictured below. 

Fushimi Inari Taisha 伏見稲荷大社

Although this this picture isn't of the temple itself, the walk in through the mountains of Kyoto around this  shrine is pretty spectacular. This shrine was first established in the year 711 and is known as the shrine with a thousand torii (Torii are the red gates you see in the picture above). Although this shrine is not normally on the list of shrines and temples to visit on a first trip to Kyoto, it is definitely worth the visit. 

Kiyomizu Temple （清水寺）

This next temple is more well quite a bit more well known and just as spectacular. Kiyomizu Temple was established in 778, but like many other temples in Japan, it has been rebuilt several times due to having been burned down.  It is well known for the beautiful colours of the tree leaves in the fall and also the pastel pink of the sakura (cherry blossoms) in the spring. 

Since this is one of the more famous temples of Kyoto I think most first timers to Japan will have this temple on their list of places to visit. 

In order to avoid boring you all too much I will limit this post to two more must see places in Japan. One for the adventurous and one for anyone willing to go slightly off the beaten path. 

For the adventurous, none other than Mount Fuji. Not only visiting it but climbing all the way to the top. 

The view is breathtaking, to say the least, and the feeling of achievement after reaching the top is pretty exhilarating. 

I am not sure how many of you have seen the sun rise from 3776 meters above the sea, but it looks something like this. 

The last place I want to introduce, is my favourite place in Japan. It is a place that the majority of people overlook when deciding where to visit while in Japan. This is likely due to the difficulty in getting there and the limited access to information in English, but I would say that anyone visiting Japan should consider visiting. The name is Mt. Aso and it is located on the southern island of Kyushu and looks something like this. 

If you like nature, the countryside and a friendly reception (regardless of whether you speak Japanese) Kyushu is the place to be. I lived there for just about two years and consider this one of my several homes.  If you are lucky enough to go in late summer you will be surrounded by fragrant flowers, sweet smelling grass and what else but hundreds of kilometres of rice paddies. 

I hope this brief introduction to "My Japan" has sparked your interest in the country and might just convince you to visit someday. If you want a travel partner or guide for the country, don't hesitate to ask! I will join you any day!!

A Day at the Zoo!

I have been holding myself back from doing a lot of sight seeing because the weather has been poor ever since arriving in Taipei. I am told that if you go to the south of Taiwan the weather is much more pleasant, but not to hold my breath on seeing nice weather in Taipei. A British friend even said that it rains more here than in the U.K. which definitely says something for the weather. 

However, knowing that if I hold back for too long, I may end up not doing anything at all, I decided to head to the Taipei Zoo with a couple of my classmates. 

As we shuffled through the gates of the zoo and the attendants took entrance tickets, we were also handed a slip of paper, which under further investigation turned out to be a ticket designating a time to go and visit the panda exhibit. 

I guess the pandas are so popular that the zoo needs to designate times for the hoards of people visiting the zoo in order to avoid chaos, and I would assume stressing the panda out too much. Although we had every intention of visiting the pandas, by the time our turn came around we were all too tired from the masses of people and walking around the rest of the zoo. 

Although we "missed out" on the pandas, by far my favourite part of the zoo was the butterfly exhibit. The butterflies were free to fly about the biosphere type building to feed on the flowers and different fruits that were set out for them. 

Here are a couple of pictures I manage to capture with my macro lens. 

Wikipedia has taught me that there are approximately 377 species of butterfly in Taiwan of which approximately 56 are endemic to the island. Needless to say, they are spectacular to photograph if you can catch them in time! 

Other than the butterflies, the Taipei Zoo is home to most other animals that you would expect to see at a zoo in pretty much any other part of the world. 

I personally liked these ones

This black bear seemed pretty content rolling around playing with it's two tires.

And like the rest of the flamingos in the zoo, this one was concentrating so hard on eating that he didn't even notice the hundreds of people crowded around its living space. 

Though the zoo wasn't any more remarkable than any other zoo I have been to, for a mere 1.50 CAD entry fee I can say I was able to get my moneys worth and take some pretty good photos at the same time. 

The only tip I would have for anyone wanting to go is to visit on a weekday to avoid the crowds!

Hunger Games and Spirited Away

With all the talk about the Hunger Games streaming on Facebook, I finally managed to make it out to the theatre to see what all the hype was about. But instead of humming and hawing about how great the movie was, I am going to entertain you by talking about my weekend.

On Saturday I woke up early to indulge in an American style breakfast; something that I haven't eaten for a long time!

By Taiwan's standards it was a relatively expensive, costing about 200 NTD (roughly 7 CAD), but it was worth every penny. I decided on the French toast breakfast which consisted of crispy bacon, hashed browns, scrambled eggs and of course French Toast. Since I love taking pictures of my food, I have one to share with you all here

I hope my photograph makes up for what my lack of expressive writing and detail. The picture makes my mouth water, anyway!

My friend who invited me out the the restaurant for breakfast had an omlet that looks something like this.

I had forgotten how delicious a good breakfast is, but now that I have rediscovered it, I may need to wake up early to have breakfast more often. 

Since the rest of my day was fairly boring, outside of watching the Hunger Games, I will skip the details and move onto Sunday's schedule, which consisted of doing some sight seeing north of Taipei City at a place called Jiufen (pronounced jo fun)

Known for it's stunning views, posh tea shops, Jiufen is also featured as one of the scenes in Miyazaki Hayao's "Spirited Away". For those who don't know much about Japan and Japanese animation, Miyazaki is one of the most famous Anime artists in Japan, and possibly the world. I don't think there is a single Japanese person who doesn't know who Miyazaki is and hasn't seen at least one of his films. 

My Neighbour Totoro is one of the most well known films, but Spirited Away is also well known. According to Wikipedia, the film grossed roughly 270 million US dollars to give you an idea of the popularity. 

Several of the buildings and scenes in the animated film were based off of buildings and areas located in Jiufen, Taiwan. This restaurant and coffee shop is one of several buildings that some of the scenes in the film  were modelled after. 

For those who haven't seen the movie, I would highly recommend it! Who knows, you may even become a fan and end up watching more of the animations. If you ever have a chance to visit Taiwan as well, I would recommend taking a day trip to Jiufen as well, it is definitely work the visit!

Just in time for sunset, my friend and I made it to the top of the hill which the town is located on and ducked into one of the many tea shops to enjoy the view and to get away from the hoards of people, who all had the same idea as we did (to spend a lovely day in a beautiful place).  Although it was overcast, the sun made its best effort to peek through the clouds and give a stunning view of the surrounding mountains and ocean. 

Though, I probably should have been studying for my Chinese midterm this past weekend, I would say my time was well spent taking in the sights and indulging in the delicious food that Taiwan has to offer. 

One month and a couple of weeks into my stay in Taiwan and I am loving every minute. I can only expect the next months to come to be even better than the first. 

Strawberries and Bus Rides

I was invited by a friend to go on a strawberry picking trip yesterday. I was a bit confused at first, because in Canada, or at least on the east coast, strawberry season is in late summer or early fall early summer (I guess I have been away from Canada too long! lol). Here in Taiwan it is apparently in early spring just as the weather starts to warm up (Starting late February).

Our day trip started at 7:30 AM at Taipei Main Station where we met to join what I later found out was a bus tour to several different destinations, one being the strawberry farm. Roughly fifteen of my friend's friends also joined the tour to make it a fairly large group.  

The first stop on our tour was to a nature park. Beautiful flowers, sweet smells, and being surrounded by nature. I don't think there 's a much better way to pass your time! I am not sure what type of flower it is in this picture, but I though it was worth a snap of the camera. 

After spending a couple hours surrounded by nature, we headed on to our next destination which was a small town to buy some food for lunch. We didn't have much time, so everyone ended up buying street food from the hawker stalls. I had a tofu sandwich and also a sausage on a stick. 

Along the way I came across this interesting sight. 

Upon enquiring, I was informed that these are pigs livers that are being dried and are normally used in certain types of Taiwanese food. I can't say that that would be my first choice of food for a meal, but I am told that it is very tasty. 

We left the town on a stomach half full and headed for the strawberry patch to spend about an hour picking and snacking on ripe, sweet and succulent strawberries. Two kilograms of berries cost a mere 200 NTD (6 CAD) so I made the most of it and picked to my hearts content!

After a filling and fulfilling strawberry picking experience we were back on the bus to head to our last stop which was a touristic area mainly meant to coax people into spending their money on the local produce, products and of course strawberries. Outside the shops there was what else but a HUGE strawberry. 

All in all, the day was a lot of fun and I suppose one of the best parts has to be that I was able to return home with a box full of strawberries that I think I will be able to eat for the next week!

Dinner Time

One of the annoying things about finding an apartment for the short term in Taiwan, is trying to find one reasonably priced that has a proper kitchen or cooking area. Of course, if I were to speak the language fluently, I am sure it would be much easier. But since my skills are laking, I gave up on trying to find an apartment with a kitchen, settled on a small place with a sink and hotplate, and took the advice of all of my friends that are Taiwanese or have lived in Taiwan: "Eat out every day, it's cheaper and a lot less of a hassle."

I was a bit sceptical at first that eating out would be cheaper than cooking by myself, but low and behold as long as I am adventurous I can easily find a place to eat dinner for under five dollars Canadian. So, following the proverb "When in Rome, do as the Romans do" I have been taking the opportunity to try new food and eat on the cheap!

Tonight was one of those times that I didn't want to venture too far away from home, so I decided to go to a local food joint that sells 3 sides of various vegetables a main dish and rice all for the low cost of 55 New Taiwan Dollars. For those of you who don't know the exchange rate, that's about $1.80 Canadian.

The dinner looked something like this

                                              Top right: Deep fried tofu

              Middle right: Stir-fried egg plant (Aubergine to some)  

                                              Bottom right: Stir-fried bean sprouts

                                              Main Dish: Fried chicken and rice on the bottom. 

Nothing elaborate or beautiful, but tasty and very filling.  

To top off dinner, I went to one of the local tea shops to buy one of the treats that Taiwan is most famously known for. BUBBLE TEA!!  I have had my fair share of bubble tea in Japan and other places, including Canada, but I would have to say that Taiwan has by far the best bubble tea out there. 

One of the most popular chain stores is 50嵐 and their bubble milk tea looks something like this

This drink costs about $1 Canadian and you can choose to have it with lots of gum syrup, none, or any amount in between, with ice or none and you can also choose big or small bubbles. The last couple times I got small bubbles, but this time I decided to try the big ones. I think I prefer these to the small ones. 

If you have never tried it, I highly recommend searching it out at a store near you!

Sunny at Last!

Sunday officially marks one month from the day that I arrived in Taiwan. Aside from not understanding much Chinese yet, things are going fairly well. One thing, however, that I haven't gotten used to is RAIN. 

Friends had warned me that Taiwan is infamous for raining in the winter, though I brushed this off thinking they were exaggerating. However, I have now realized that they were far from exaggerating!

Of the 28 days I have been in Taiwan,  it has rained on 25 of the days. After not taking advantage of the first two sunny days, I decided that there was no time like the present to do something new here in Taipei. So, after my Chinese lessons I hopped on the MRT and then a bus and headed to a touristic village called Wūlǎi. 

The village lies on the outskirts of Taipei City and takes approximately 40 minutes by bus to get to. 

The first stop on the trip was to a restaurant for lunch. I decided to try the stir-fried noodles featured below. 

Stir Fried Noodles

炒麵

The next stop on the excursion was to the miniature train running 1.6 kilometres  and arrives at a waterfall in the mountains. The ride cost about 1.50 CAD and is about 10 minutes. The ride is quite bumpy and at times it felt like we might come off the tracks when going through the curves, but at a breath taking 5-6 kilometres, I am sure that wouldn't be possible. 

There is also a gondola that brings riders to the top of the waterfall, but we didn't have time to ride it this time. I guess it's good to leave some things to do for next time I visit!

With mountains in the background and a river flowing through the middle, the area the village is very Taiwan-esque. 

Tomorrow and Sunday are also supposed to be sunny and warm, so I will hopefully be able to take advantage of the nice weather to take some photos and visit some other new places. 

Buddha's Birthday?

Having been in Taiwan for three weeks now, I figured it was about time to start doing some sight seeing around Taipei. Since it is my third time here, I have been to most of the major tourist sites, so this time I decided to see a couple of temples that are pretty famous, but I had not managed to visit yet.

Both of the temples that I visited yesterday were Buddhist temples and upon arriving at both locations I was greeted with literally hoards of people. Weekends normally draw crowds of people to the temples to pray for one thing or another, but yesterday exceeded anything that I had ever seen outside of the New Year and any religious holiday. I later found out that it was apparently Buddha's birthday yesterday which explains the crowds. 

The first temple I went to is called Xíngtiāngōng and is one of the most famous temples in Taipei. Here are a couple of pictures I captured at the temple. 

行天宮

A lady giving an offering at the temple

After spending some time in the temple and snapping a few photos, I left to seek out somewhere warm, only to end up in a cafe eating a frozen mango smoothie. 

Nothing beats a cold smoothie on a cold day! lol

The next temple is also pretty famous and is called Lóngshānsì located pretty centrally in Taipei. I didn't realize it until I got there, but I had already visited this temple on my first visit to Taipei, so needless to say, with the crowds the way they were, I didn't stick around for too long. 

龍山寺

What I found more interesting, was the anti-nuclear demonstration that I had good enough timing to stumble upon while exiting the MRT station to get to this temple. Perhaps the organizers wanted to hold the protest in conjunction with the anniversary of the Great Eastern Japan Earthquake and the nuclear accident in Fukushima, Japan. 

One thing I have learned about a large majority of people in Asia over the past six years is that they are very superstitious and they really like getting fortunes told, palms read, and learning about peoples blood types or zodiac signs. Apparently blood types (for Japanese people anyway) can tell you a lot about peoples personalities and of course palm reading can tell you a lot about your own life. 

So, I decided to join the masses and get my palm read. Now, since my Chinese is far from perfect, I was able to find a palm reader who was able to give my reading in Japanese. 

So, I suppose you are wondering what's the outlook on my life? I am told it looks like this:

Emotions: 2012 will be a stressful year, but will get better as the time passes. 

Health: No significant problems, but I shouldn't hold my bladder…..lol…. And I should eat relatively healthy to put less stress on my kidneys. 

Employment: Finance and Investment is a good field for me and rather than working for someone I should think about starting up something on my own. 

Finances: I will see a lot of expenditures in 2012, but 2013 and after should be prosperous. 

Investment:  I should think about buying property in the near future. 

Relationships: 2015 or after is a good time to get married. 

Colours: Gold, black, white, and blue are good colours for me. 

The palm reader stressed several times that 2013, 2014, and 2015 will be good years and things will only get better from there. 

I suppose most of the things that he mentioned could really be thought up by anyone with any type of common sense, but it is always a bit of fun to go and see what a fortune teller will say and what they predict for your future whether you believe it or not. 

-Pins on a Map-

Pop Culture

When going somewhere new, I always like to learn a little bit about that countries pop culture. Anything from movies to music to the local art scene. Not only interesting, but things like music and movies can also help with learning a language, which is what I am here for.

Through my own searching and a bit of help from some Taiwanese friends I have managed to find a few songs that I have begun to enjoy and thought I would share.

Hebe 田馥甄 - LOVE! 

Tián Fūzhēn is the singers name but she also goes by the name Hebe. A quick google search has taught me that Hebe is actually the goddess of youth in Greek mythology. I guess that goes to show how much I DON'T know about Greek mythology. 

The next song is by a Taiwanese American singer named Anthony Neely who grew up in San Francisco. He participated in a singing competition; the Taiwanese equivalent to American Idol, where he received top marks and became well known. He also has a few songs sung in English so if you don't like listening to Chinese than he is still worth a listen. 

 一覺醒來 Awakening

倪安東 - Anthony Neely

Yesterday I also went to see a Taiwanese movie. Since movie theatres are quite a bit less expensive here compared to Japan (around 8 dollars to see a movie) I have taken the opportunity to indulge in some film viewing. 

愛 LOVE

This movie features some of Taiwan's most recently famous actors and is a story about love, as the title suggests. The interesting part of the plot; however, is how all of the relationships of the characters in the movie are intertwined. 

Another interesting piece of information is that one of the main characters, Eddie Peng actually grew up in Vancouver Canada. Apparently, he was scouted to become an actor while visiting relatives in Taiwan and ended up moving here to pursue his career in acting

I was surprised to find out that the movie had English subtitles. Without them I am sure I would have been pretty confused about everything that happened in the movie. Hopefully I will eventually be able to understand the movie without English subtitles!

My first taste of Taiwanese pop culture has been pretty good and I would have to say it has left me wanting to learn more. I will see what else I can dig up in the next couple months to share. 

Fabulous Eats and Delicious Treats

First impressions of Taiwan?  People here love to eat. No matter what time of the day or where you are in Taiwan, there is always some sort of café, noodle shop, or food stall to be found close by. 

This past Tuesday I was reunited with a long time friend, who lives in Tokyo but was visiting her family in Taiwan. And of course, in Taiwan there is no better way to catch up than over a hot meal or with some type of snack. 

阜杭豆漿

Fùhángdòujiāng

Food and drinks made with soy milk are the specialty of this restaurant and with prices as low as fifty cents Canadian for a bread like dumplings, it's no wonder the restaurant gathers crowds big enough to require waits of up to forty minutes. We were lucky enough to only have to wait for about twenty minutes before ordering. 

My meal consisted of a sweet and salty panini-like bun filled with green onions and a bowl of cold and fresh soy milk. 

厚 燒餅

Hòu shāobǐng

I hope to go back to this place as it was great for a light lunch, or it would even be great for a snack as they also have some desserts as well. 

After eating we wandered around Taipei for a while before saying good bye and parting ways at which time I headed over to a different part of Taipei to meet up with another friend for dessert at a very nice cafe. 

Since I am a die-hard dessert fan, I couldn't pass up getting both a piece of cake and a smoothie made with fresh fresh strawberries which are currently in season. 

An absolutely delicious way to end off the day! I unfortunately didn't get the name of the café, but I remember the location, so I have a feeling it won't be the last time I go. 

So much food, and so little time! I think I am also going to start exercising again so I don't gain an enormous amount of weight from all of the eating!

For anyone visiting Taiwan, I can confidently say if you leave hungry, there must be something wrong with you!

A New Beginning

Five years, six months, and twenty days. The number representing the amount of time I made Japan my home. Add the ten months spent in Japan on my study abroad my total increases to roughly six years, four months and twenty days.

It still hasn't completely sunken in, that I am not returning to Japan to live, but I think I will continue to gradually warm up to the idea of starting something new, unknown and exciting, somewhere in Canada. 

Before making the transition back into Canadian society and to make the most of my remaining time in Asia, I have packed my bags and boarded a plane bound for the Republic of China, more commonly known as Táiwān.

Some information about the country courtesy of Táiwān Tourism Bureau's homepage

Area: 36,000 square kilometres
Population: 23 million
Language: Mandarin/Taiwanese/Hakka/Indigenous Languages


Just to add some perspective, New Brunswick, Canada has an area of roughly 73,000 square kilometres. Roughly double that of Táiwān. Yet the population is roughly thirty one times that of New Brunswick.

Although this is my third time visiting Táiwān, here are some first (or should I say third) time impressions:

-Life revolves around food.
-Things are fairly cheap (Makes sense coming from Japan)
-Taiwanese people seem to love things Japanese (Food, anime/manga, music… the list goes on)


To finish off my first blog post, I leave you with a picture of one of the most famous night markets in Taipei. Night markets are culinary must here in Táiwān, full of hawker stalls selling anything and everything. I haven't been daring enough to try everything, but I have had my fair share of sweets and snacks.

士林夜市

Shìlín Night Market